Karate Kid Legends didn’t need to be made

Karate Kid Legends wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t good enough to justify being made.

When I was a kid, ninjas were the coolest thing ever after dinosaurs. Me and my friends loved watching movies about ninjas, like 3 Ninjas, Surf Ninjas, and those live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies. What do you expect from the generation that grew up watching Mighty Morphin Power Rangers?

The original Karate Kid movie from 1984 wasn’t a ninja movie, but we watched it too because it had kids doing karate. There was a lot of waxing on and waxing off going on in the schoolyard (mostly the off part), and we all thought we were Daniel-san. We also assumed that every old Chinese man we saw was a secret martial arts master, but none of us were innocently racist enough to actually try to get them to train us.

When Cobra Kai was announced for 2018, I groaned at the obvious attempt to cash in on 80’s nostalgia. But then I caved in to peer pressure, and ended up getting hooked to the series. Was it still an obvious attempt to cash in on 80’s nostalgia? Of course it was. But it was fun. The story was enjoyable, the fights were choreographed well enough, and the series didn’t take itself too seriously. Every other scene someone was throwing hands over something stupid, it was hilarious. Cobra Kai was a great show if you wanted to turn your brain off for a few hours and get lost in the absurdity of teenage karate gangs wreaking havoc across the streets of suburban LA.

But then they took it too far.

Capitalizing on the success of Cobra Kai, Ralph Macchio said “Hey, this is great. Now what if we take the same story from the original Karate Kid movie, but change a couple of small things around and sell it as a whole new movie? Oh, and we’ll get Jackie Chan too.”

You can only retell the same story so many times before it becomes boring. While Karate Kid Legends isn’t necessarily the same exact story as the original, it doesn’t really bring anything fresh to the franchise either. The main character, Li, is a very Americanized Chinese immigrant who moves with his mother to New York City. He meets a girl, gets into a fight with her martial arts master ex-boyfriend, then decides to take him on in a popular karate tournament. His sensei from back in China comes over to help him train for the fight. They changed a few things from the original Karate Kid, but not enough to make this movie stand out.

Was it cool to see Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio together? Hell yeah. Jackie Chan is always a delight, and the interactions between his and Ralph Macchio’s characters were enjoyable. You can tell that Jackie and Ralph genuinely enjoyed being there. To be fair though, I feel like Jackie Chan could enjoy being anywhere.

I’m admittedly biased on this one because I grew up in an era where Jackie Chan was in a lot of kids movies, but it’s always fun to see Jackie Chan on the screen, his lighthearted banter and charm never fail to win me over no matter what movie he’s in. Regardless of whether you liked the Karate Kid remake from 2010 (I personally enjoyed it), you have to acknowledge that Jackie Chan’s performance was definitely one of the movie’s highlights.

The thing is though, Jackie Chan can’t make up for an idea that’s been done to death. Does he bring his notoriously loveable charm to Karate Kid Legends? Yes. But does he bring anything new or unique to the franchise? No, not really. There’s just nothing in Legends that wasn’t already done in the other Karate Kid movies or Cobra Kai. Plot-wise, the 2010 remake was similar to the original, but it still brought a somewhat fresh take to the franchise by moving the setting to China and having the protagonist as a black American trying to adapt to Chinese culture (this was the one time where I think playing into a racial struggle would have benefited the story, but they didn’t take advantage of this enough). It was essentially a modern retelling of the original film with enough changed that it could stand on its own.

It would be unfair to try to compare a movie that’s an hour and a half long to a series that ran for six seasons, but after the hype that Cobra Kai built, I just feel let down by Legends. Cobra Kai took the strong elements of the original movies and used them to build something new that was fun and fresh. Legends took the strong elements of the original movies and the remake and used them to basically just create another remake that brought the previous remake into the same universe as the original. Are they trying to create a Karate Kid cinematic universe or something?

I give credit to the cast, they weren’t bad. Given the fact that they were just rehashing the previous movies, they did the best they could. I can’t think of anything really good or bad to say about them, though there was definitely something funny though about seeing Melinda May from Agents of SHIELD being against martial arts. I’m also intrigued by their bold decision to include a Jewish Harry Potter, who was clearly meant to be Li Fong’s comic relief but didn’t get enough screentime to really do anything.

Karate Kid Legends wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t good enough to justify being made. If you’ve got nothing else to do and want to kill an hour and a half then put it on, but prepare to be very underwhelmed.

I can’t really think of anything else that can be done with the Karate Kid franchise at this point that wasn’t done in the other movies or in Cobra Kai. I appreciate how much you’ve expanded the franchise, but it’s time to move on now, Ralph. I personally would like to see an expansion of the My Cousin Vinny cinematic universe, so maybe you can work on that next.